Faced with growing alarm over the nation's soaring debt, the White House and congressional Democrats tentatively agreed Tuesday to create an independent budget commission and to put its recommendations for fiscal solvency to a vote in Congress by the end of this year.
Under the agreement, President Obama would issue an executive order to create an 18-member panel that would be granted broad authority to propose changes in the tax code and in the massive federal entitlement programs -- including Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security -- that threaten to drive the nation's debt to levels not seen since World War II.
20 comments:
Panel or no panel, Congress will turn this into a bigger mess than the health care "reform" fiasco.
The soaring debt is surprising??? Where were the White House and House Demo's when their parents taught them to not spend more money than they make? Perhaps they believed that basic finance rules didn't apply.
Well, they all better start polishing their resumes because if they do the right thing to rein in spending, they won't be re-elected. We are all too used to feeding at the public trough.
Man, some of your readers have horrible short-term memories. Obama inherited a 1.3 Trillion dollar deficit from Bush.
I agree with commen#3
It's my opinon,the only people who benefit from republican leadership are the elderly and the wealthy.
It's,in my opinion,stupidity for some poor person to vote republican. And i doubt there are any true devoted christians in this country to warrant it either.
They all spend more than they receive. Point the finger at the whole lot. The article was about the current White House and the House democrats. When did either party balance the budget or spend less than they receive? What decade was it? Not sure it was in my lifetime.
My voting plan is lately been to vote out any incumbant. Either party. Both parties have failed to curb spending and none of the current legislators deserve a second, third, tenth chance.
"Faced with growing alarm over the nation's soaring debt, the White House and congressional Democrats.."
More like worried about being out of a job after what happened on Tuesday in Massachusetts.
"My voting plan is lately been to vote out any incumbant. Either party. Both parties have failed to curb spending and none of the current legislators deserve a second, third, tenth chance."
Ditto for me on that.
"Man, some of your readers have horrible short-term memories. Obama inherited a 1.3 Trillion dollar deficit from Bush."
What did he proceed to do but add plenty more to it. God only knows what it would be if all his and the Dems knucklehead plans became law.
All of a sudden Obama and the Dems have the deficit reduction religion. I think this was a ballot box conversion. LOL
Hello out there in short term memory loss land.
I do beleive that the Dope was handed over a 7 billion dollar (or was it trillion) surplus and what did he proceed to do? He blew the surplus and spent zillions more on fake war so that he and his buddies could make zillions in contracting.
Obama inherited a mess and has maded a good dent in making it better. The dow is over 10,000 again, jobs are returning, housing starts are starting to rebound and retail sales are on the way back.
Keep voting repuglican and you will be somewhere circa the late 80's. Remember "How ya doing?".
I noticed that the comission won't be looking at the biggest entitlement program of all - the military. Pink elephant anyone?
And I don't really care if you're republican or democrat, but increased public spending in a recession has been very, very basic economic theory for over 80 years. People who criticize the recent spending obviously haven't taken a single economics or finance class, so I don't care what you have to say.
From Jan. 20, 2001, to Jan. 20, 2009, the debt held by the public grew $3 trillion and under Bush to $6.3 trillion from $3.3 trillion at a time when the national economy grew as well.
From the day Obama took office last year to the end of the current fiscal year, according to the Office of Management and Budget, the debt held by the public will grow by $3.3 trillion. In 20 months, Mr. Obama will add as much debt as Mr. Bush ran up in eight years.
Obama's spending plan approved by Congress last February calls for doubling the national debt in five years and nearly tripling it in 10.
All of which, as No Saj pointed out, is standard, accepted economic theory for address a huge recession. There is no other choice in the short run. It's the long run that matters most, and getting a handle on that is critically important.
What I think is amazing is that people believe that the federal debt was created by short term problems and can be solved with short term solutions. The recession was mostly created by the housing bubble that was mostly created by the easing up of mortgage loan regulations and the creation of sub-prime lenders that started over 10 years ago by policies from the Clinton administration. And Bush didn't do anything to stop it. The recovery is partially fueled by the deficit spending of the Obama administration. These are not real solutions.
The first goal of every politician is to get re-elected and none of them are willing to make the hard, long term decisions that will bring down deficit spending because it will be too unpopular.
Look at Social Security. It started out as a simple retirement program, one of the expected three cornerstones of having money to live on in old age, the other two being savings and pensions. It has morphed into the major source of income for the elderly, the only source for many; the major source of income for those who suffer medical misfortune; and a big source of income for widows and orphans. Politicians have known for decades that the program cannot sustain itself for the long term and yet attempts to change it (and privatize is not the best solution IMO) have failed because Congress doesn't have the balls to make the hard choices because the current constituants will support someone who promises more money for them.
Again, my policy is vote out the incumbant. Term limits for every politician, even the Senators. Forces them to use their energies and talents to finding solutions rather than figuring out how to get re-elected. And, like every other decision, I have no doubt that there are unintended consequences to my choices as well.
No Saj-
Actually, increased public spending in a recession has always had detractors. Contrary to Nixon, not everybody is a Keynesian.
I guess it's obvious that you've been quite limited in your economics/finance readings. So why should we care what you have to say?
Detractors? Of course there's always the loony fringe, but there are virtually no detractors from the established economic fact that, when the economy contracts and the private sector won't, or can't, generate economic activity, the government has to step in and stimulate that activity. And since revenues will be down, deficit spending--i.e., borrowing--is the only way to accomplish that. If there's a serious alternative theory/plan, let's hear it. Detractors my ... foot.
Okay, so many of the most recent Nobel (memorial) prize in economics are on the loony fringe. Right. Good to know.
Of course, that doesn't include Krugman!
But seriously, many mainline economists do not hold the Keynesian model. Yes, it is easy to explain to undergraduates and it is necessary to understand because so many politicians use that framework. That's why it's in textbooks. But that does not mean it is the only framework. Modern macroeconomics has generally not been kind to Keynesians.
We're getting far afield from the subject of my original post.
I'm going to delete further comments that just debate economic theory.
Charles T. Hall
Looks like we all agree on one thing. Politicians all spend more money than they have available. Under any economic theory. And it will take decades and several adminstrations to fix this problem. But it means hard choices and politicians won't do that because they want to be re-elected.
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